"It's coming home."
That was the message from World Rugby chairman Bill Beaumont, as New Zealand won the rights to host the Women's Rugby World Cup 2021.
The Black Ferns, five-time world champions, finally get the chance to play for the title at home at the first World Cup staged in the southern hemisphere.
Seven of the eight Women's World Cup tournaments - which started in 1991 - have been staged in Europe, with the 2006 event in Canada the only exception.
New Zealand beat out Australia in the final voting process with the World Rugby council voting 25-17 in favour of New Zealand.
England, France, Wales and Portugal had expressed an interest in hosting the tournament, but only New Zealand and Australia put formal bids forward.
Former Black Ferns captain Dr Farah Palmer, now a New Zealand Rugby (NZR) board member, led the winning presentation at a meeting in Dublin, along with NZR director Mark Robinson, while NZR chief executive Steve Tew and former All Blacks doctor Deb Robinson also attended.
Beaumont said Dr Palmer led a passionate presentation that helped New Zealand win the right to defend the World Cup - which they won in Ireland last year - on home soil.
World Rugby chairman Bill Beaumont said the decision was international recognition of the obsession for rugby in New Zealand.
"If I was a Kiwi, I'd think it's sort of coming home now," he said. "Every member of the World Rugby Council would have got a fully documented appraisal of the two bids.
"Then, it was just about fine-tuning and just what little bits got you excited, and that's what obviously New Zealanders did extremely well.
"You listen to the presentation and it was the passion - the passion for the sport. Everyone knows what it means to Kiwis, it's in their DNA.
"I think people… want to test themselves against the best women's teams in a backdrop of extremely knowledgeable rugby people.
"There is no better place."
Dr Palmer said she struggled to control her emotions, when it was announced that New Zealand would host the 12-team tournament.
"I'm over the moon," she said. "This is about the momentum we've got for women's rugby.
"With the Black Ferns based in Aotearoa, New Zealand, we pitched it that if you played women's rugby, you'd want to come to New Zealand.
"I'm absolutely ecstatic - I'm just holding it all in at the moment.
"We always look forward to the women's Rugby World Cup, and then we come home and say 'when are we going to have it back here?' This is something we've been wanting for a long time and the timing is right.
"I spoke with emotion and passion, and said this is what it means to us."
Dr Palmer added that New Zealand's promise to host the World Cup was to stage a Pacific Nations tournament, but those details still need to be ironed out some more.
The end goal was to help find more talent around the Islands and get more teams fighting for World Cup spots.
"Part of our pitch is that we want to hold a Pacific Nations tournament to help grow the game in the Oceania region, so this will give us an opportunity to do that," Dr Palmer added.
"We don't know what that will look like yet, but we do believe that will be a great opportunity, because it is untapped potential. They're not often in the World Cup, so it will be great for their development.
"This isn't just some superficial thing we decided to do at the last minute. We've been working towards it.
"We've been putting a lot of investment into the women's game - we've got the Black Ferns contracted now, we've got really good programmes with the provincial teams."
World Cup matches will be played at the 5000-capacity Waitakere Stadium in Auckland and Whangarei's Northland Events Centre, as well as the 25,000-capacity Albany Stadium and Eden Park, which hosted the men's Rugby World Cup 2011 final.
The tournament will also feature format changes, including an increase in length from 23 to 35 days, while a quarter-final stage has been introduced and eliminated teams will now exit the event, rather than play classification matches.
The Black Ferns won a record fifth women's Rugby World Cup title last year in Ireland, beating England 41-32 in the final.
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